Post Vacation Blues

I am having a hard time adjusting back to our routine after spending spring break with my family in Utah. It was such a nice break from real life. The drive back was brutal. 12 hours in the car is already just hard and when you add in two sick kids, it is a recipe for insanity. I took Grace in to the doctor when we got home and she has some virus that is making her breathing irregular, fast, and wheezy. So we have to do breathing treatments with a nebulizer every 4 hours. I think it is helping, but have you ever tried to make a 10 month old sit still for 10 minutes with a mask on their face? It is impossible. We do the best we can.

Since we have been back, well I guess it started while we were on our crazy 12 hour trek back, Addie has been so naughty. It has been baffling, only because she is usually one of the most obedient and sweet children. So Jon and I keep looking at each other in disbelief as she has turned into a completely different child. On the way home she kept undoing her seat belt, opening her door (while we were on the freeway), undoing her sister's seat belt etc. And it hasn't gotten better since we came home. Throwing all the books off her shelves on the floor, drinking the nebulizer medicine, dumping dirt by the bucketful on my back porch. I hope it is just an adjustment period from playing non stop with cousins. I need to find something to entertain her or move closer to cousins.

We did get some great news yesterday at the eye doctor. He had previously told us that Addie was going to need surgery again (she had it first at 5 months old because she was born with strabismus, I talked about it in this post). We went into the appointment thinking we were there to schedule her eye surgery, but he said that her eyes were looking way straighter and better and that he wouldn't recommend it right now. She still will wear glasses and need to patch her strong eye daily, but no surgery for now. Hooray! It doesn't mean she won't need it in the future, he said she probably will, but it will be when she is older, which will make me less nervous. So last night we had a little celebration, and since then Addie has been acting a little better.

But Utah was wonderful. My youngest brother came home from his mission and we got to be there for his welcome home talk. And my other brother planned his son's baby blessing for the same day so we could all be there as well. It was a little surreal that my family is that "grown up". All my siblings were there and it has been a while since we have all been in the same place...so we got a picture. And one of the 2nd generation (all except most of Amy's kids that couldn't come and baby James who was blessed that day).

Pretty girl

So for the last few months, Grace hasn't let me put any type of bow or headband on her head. The second I would put it on her head...even with really good distraction techniques...she would rip it off or pull it over her head on to her neck and bite on it. After many failed attempts, I just gave up for a few months. But as we were getting ready for church yesterday I thought I would try again. So I put her in front of the mirror and I let her watch me put the headband and flower on her head and then I said over and over "pretty girl". She had this huge smile looking at herself, and she left it on and didn't touch it all through church. It was AMAZING. I was a little shocked that it worked so well. Do girls come with that need for praise and to feel pretty built in?

I have been reading a book called "Cinderella Ate My Daughter" for our law school wives book club, and it is a little feminist charged...to say the least. It is all about the "pretty princess culture" that is so rampant with little girls right now. So I felt a little bad that I resorted to such techniques with Grace, but part of me is just happy it worked and she looked girly and pretty at church. I was kind of getting sick of people calling her a little boy.

I actually like that my girls like to be girly. Addie loves princesses and would wear a dress or skirt every day if I let her...actually just this morning she had a break down because none of her dresses were clean and she didn't want to wear ANYTHING but a dress. But Addie also spent her birthday money on a basketball (a pink and purple one but still a ball) and spent the weekend with her Dad at the park shooting baskets. She is practicing up for a sports class she is taking...and she chose that class over the dance one that she usually does. So I think as long as they are balanced, that it is ok that they like to dress up or love the color pink. Maybe it is a culture thing or a marketing/media thing (as the author of that book suggests), but I think some of them come like that.

I do think some people are crazy overboard though. Have you seen the show "Toddlers and Tiaras"? Tom Hanks and his daughter spoofed it pretty accurately...hilarious.